Life in Rural America

Tag: cord

When people hear the word “trotline”, most may think of stringing a line across a river or a slew to catch some catfish. While its true that trotline is mainly used to catch catfish, it has lots of other uses.

Jug lines – this is where some type of float is used and the trotline is tied to the float. The float floats with the current of the river or stream, and goes where nature takes it. For most jug lines, people use 1 gallon beach bottles, noodles, or just about anything that floats and a line can be tied to it.

Braided cord – in a pinch, trotline string can be braided to make a cord. While on a camping trip back in 2008 with my kids, we brought some new hammocks with us, and the new hammocks did not have cord included to attach the hammock to a tree. Well, there we were with hammocks and no way to hang them up. So what did we do? I got a spool to trotline string out, then my kids and I took turns braiding the string into a heavier cord. we got the hammocks strung up and everything was fine.